The Wright Perspective: On Liberty

From the first primitive tribes under the paternal leadership of their elders to the most decadent years of the Pharaohs of Egypt or the God-Kings of Babylon, the Emperors of Rome or of Japan, the default assumption was that the great men were ordained by heaven to rule over the lesser men, allegedly for their own good. The idea that men were unequal, not just in wealth and rank, but in their innate, inner worth, their spiritual worth, is universal and worldwide.

Only with the coming of Christendom is a new concept introduced into human history: the concept of individualism, of equality. Christian princes held a higher rank than a pauper, but both knew that both would be naked on Judgment Day. Both knew that Saint Louis was no more nor less a saint than Saint Francis, albeit one was a prince and the other a pauper; both knew the laws of God applied equally to both. This concept was clarified and refined through the ages until, in America, a second new concept was introduced into human history, the concept of the people acting as their own prince, acting without a prince, merely with the law as their leader, and the state would be ordained by men, not by heaven, to act only in a limited sphere. It was an ideal of a small and limited government ruled by rules rather than by princes.

The mass neurosis called Political Correctness (sometimes called Leftism or Liberalism or Progressivism or Morlockery) is the old days back again. It is the old system of government we had in the Stone Ages, where the tribal chief acted as father and priest and god-king, and in his expert wisdom, decided each detail of anything that concerned the tribe. Political Correctness is the old corrupt system of the Pharaohs and Tyrants and Sultans of the East, unlimited government, government by courtiers, government by cronies, government in every nook and smallest crevasse of life.

It is the claim that we have persons who have an innate and inner superiority to us. By happy coincidence, our superiors happen to be them, the very people who lust over power over us and over each last tiny details of our lives and thought.

John C. Wright is a practicing philosopher, a retired attorney, newspaperman, and newspaper editor, and a published author of science fiction. Once a Houyhnhnm, he was expelled from the august ranks of purely rational beings when he fell in love; but retains an honorary title.

21 Comments

Political Correctness is the old corrupt system of the Pharaohs and Tyrants and Sultans of the East, unlimited government, government by courtiers, government by cronies, government in every nook and smallest crevasse of life.

The absolute power of the Pharaohs and Sultans is vastly overstated. They did not have the wealth or technology to have a huge government capable of meddling in every tiny crevasse of human life. (Really, they did not even have the desire to do this – they did not much care what the rabble thought, said, or did so long as they obeyed.)

PC is just the new variation of Communism. The proletariat is passe as the victim class; women, minorities, and gays are the new victim class, which requires a large, intrusive government commanded by an elite – let’s call them a vanguard group.

You will note that PC also preaches equality. Indeed, it is in the name of equality that they justify all that intrusion into every aspect of economic, social, and private life.

I think you are right, the old autocracies of ancient Egypt and Imperial Rome were not like the modern day tyranny of Political Correctness. As long as you obeyed, most people were left alone as regards their everyday lives.

But, I do agree with Mr. Wright that Christianity introduced the idea that all human beings are “equal” as regards their human NATURES. So, while a Christian prince or president have a higher rank than a pauper, they would both, rulers and ruled, be judged by God.

An important feature of Imperial Rome’s supposed rule of law was the utter lack of police – there was no independent force that could, in theory at least, enforce the laws. When two equals had a spat, they could take it up with their local patriarch (local government outside the big cities was managed by the head of the most powerful local family). Your chances of prevailing in a dispute before your local lord had a lot to do with how loyal you were to that lord – a whole system of paying your respects and accepting meals from your lord that cemented your client status was designed to ensure your lord knew who was playing ball and who wasn’t.

If a weaker man had a beef with a stronger, his options were limited. He could try to get a lord more powerful than either to intervene on his behalf, or, as occasionally happened, hire some thugs to kidnap his opponent and drag him to court. You’d better win in that case.

Anyway, life in ancient Rome more resembled life under a semi-benevolent Mafia Don than a land ruled by law. The key difference with moderns is that Romans saw custom as a force for order and stability, not as an enemy to ‘progress’.

Never underestimate the draw of making claims that will cause people to take offense.

The only people who would take offense at the articles about bewbs would not be hanging around a site like EveryJoe in the first place.

And we have to be honest, the tone of the article is more than a little provocative, even if what it describes is correct. The fact of the matter is, the thinking of so many people is as aberrant as our host describes, but few people realize it or understand it. I have only come to realize that very recently upon encountering so many people who simply cannot be reasoned with in any meaningful way.

One only has to look at what passes for public discourse and look at the complete fools and knaves we elect to high office to see how off track we are as a society. Anyone who thinks anything said by Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, or even the President isn’t complete gibberish has a serious reality deficit in their thinking. Nonsense has become the norm. Blatantly claiming what is clearly and obviously not true has become commonplace, and a lot of people seem to think there’s nothing wrong with this, or that it’s business as usual. It’s not. There’s always been corruption and stupidity and foolishness (and there always will be), but things are most assuredly much worse now that they were in recent decades. Doublethink is rampant and it’s often difficult to have a conversation, leave alone a serious debate. It’s weird, and it’s creepy and it’s deeply sad.

This decline is not something anyone wants to consider, and so most of us don’t. I sure hate to dwell on it. I get tired of being outraged, but it’s the only logical response. But it’s worse with many younger people who have much less “normal” to compare it to, than people who are middle-aged and older.

Ah, because last weeks post I insulted the Leftwing version of the Prophet of Islam and the Sacred Cow of India. Sex is innately ecstatic: it is an overwhelming pleasure, a union, and therefore (but woe to the Lefty who admits this) the closest thing the materially-minded man has to a religious experience and unity with the divine. Sex is innately mystical.

So when I made the outrageous claim that there is a right way and a wrong way to approach their great god, Eros, and that the right way was more fun, the Leftist paramount idea was challenged at the most fundamental level.

Leftism *IS* perversion, both intellectual and legal, but also sexual and physical. Leftism *IS* the parasite attempting to distort, maim, corrupt and kill its host. That is all it does. It is not a worldview, but a mental process that destroys worldviews.

The Leftist process can only operate by equating two unequal things: calling food poison, calling normal abnormal, calling wage-earning slavery, calling evil good and good evil.

Leftism dulls the mental acuity. That is its purpose. You should read in the comments one poor soul unable to comprehend the idea of loving subordination as separate from servile obedience. I do not think the comments were in bad faith: the poor fool had been lobotomized by Leftist ideas, and had no categories, no vocabulary, no conceptual tools to grasp the obvious.

Calling good evil and evil good is a word game, not a worldview. The central idea of this word game is to call perversions equal to (or better than, because they are more brave) the wholesome, to call ugly better than beauty, to called sodomy better than matrimony.

So for me to utter the obvious truth (which I strongly suspect they all know but dare not acknowledge, hence their venom) that matrimony is more fun than sodomy or sexual predation is a direct attack on their highest and most sacred idol, perversion, had to be met by their one, sole, and only weapon: the utterly futile child-fury of name-calling.

They cannot form an argument because persons who can form arguments are not Lefties. This did not used to be the case. I remember reading actual thoughts written down in a coherent order by persons who tried to persuade others by means of rhetoric and logic to his side. Now, a corner has been turned, and the Leftists feel no need to persuade, and apparently have lost the talent. So they nag.

Some commentators believe that abortion is the Lefty sacrament. But this would not be an issue were not sexual disorders sacred to them.

It doesn’t help that most young people haven’t seen a good example of matrimony. Since roughly 50% marriages end in divorce, there can be little doubt that those were good marriages to begin with.

I don’t think I’m a great parent in many respects, but I have tried to bring up my kids well. However, one thing I think I’ve done right is showing them what a happy marriage can be.

No one who knows my wife and me well cannot fail to see that we love each other and are best friends. We rarely argue, and if we do, it’s usually because I’m in a foul mood and not willing to act like a human. Despite our shortcomings, I think we’ve managed to set a good example of why marriage is a good thing.

However, I have to wonder how many kids in the world today are growing up experiencing a good marriage up close. It can hardly be a majority of them, and is quite possibly very rare. So naturally, they are suspicious of marriage as an institution, and suspicious that there can be anything like “loving submission”. Such an idea would be alien to someone who has only experienced people using each other.

I also agree with the charge that “persons who can form arguments are not Lefties”, and I also agree that this wasn’t the case not too long ago. It’s really frustrating, too, because one you get the foot of reason in the door, you will find common ground with nearly anyone.

Loving marriages? A growing segment of our population is growing up outside of any kind of marriage whatsoever. But as our population continues to grow more grasping and lawless, leftists will remain completely unable to make that very basic connection.

Mind you, there are socialist identitarians. They tend to be people who were identitarians, then decided they were socialists, and are still wrestling with the basic socialist premise that social class matters more than social identity.